Education
Ph.D. in Theoretical Linguistics, Indiana University (Bloomington)
M.A. in Applied Linguistics (Literacy Studies), Indiana University (Bloomington)
M.A. in Linguistics, Université Abdou Moumouni (Niamey, Niger Republic)
Biographical Notes
Ousseina D. Alidou is a Professor in the Department of African, Middle Eastern, and South Asian Languages and Literature and Comparative Literature at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. She is Rutgers University Academic Director of the Mandela Washington Young Fellowship/YALI-Civic Leadership (2016-present); Professor Alidou is a theoretical linguist, gender, and cultural critic whose research focuses on women’s agency in African Muslim societies in the Sahel and East Africa (Kenya); gendered discourses of citizenship and rights; gender, education, politics, and leadership. She is the author of Engaging Modernity: Muslim Women and the Politics of Agency in Postcolonial Niger (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2005, a runner-up Aidoo-Schneider Book Prize of Women's Caucus of the Association of African Studies) and Muslim Women in Postcolonial Kenya: Leadership, Representation, Political and Social Change (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2013); Alidou co-edited Writing through the Visual and Virtual: Inscribing Language, Literature, and Culture in Francophone Africa and the Caribbean with Renée Larrier (Kentucky: (After the Empire: The Francophone World and Postcolonial France) Lexington Book, 2015); Post-Conflict Reconstruction in Africa with Ahmed Sikainga ( (Trenton: Africa World Press, 2006) and A Thousand Flowers: Social Struggles Against Structural Adjustment in African Universities, Co-edited with Silvia Federici and George Caffentzis (Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 2000);. In addition, she has published over 50 book chapters and articles which appear in Research in African Literatures, Sprache und Geschichte in Afrika (SUGIA); Comparative Literature; and Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East; and Africa Today.
Professor Ousseina Alidou is the recipient of several national and international scholarly and service awards including the Obafemi Awolowo Center for Gender and Social Policy Studies Distinguished Visiting Scholar Service Award (2015); Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Award (2015); Newark Women-in-the Media Distinguished Community Service Award (2015); Rutgers University 2011 Warren I. Susman Award for Excellence in Teaching; Africa America Institute (AAI)’s Distinguished Alumni Award (2010) and serves currently as AAI Board Member; Ford Foundation Human Rights and Social Justice Grant Award (2005); Rutgers University Board of Trustee’s Scholarly Excellence Award (2005); University of Hamburg, GERMANY, Visiting Professor Fellowship, Department of Linguistics and African Studies and Graduate Faculty of Intercultural Education (2003) ; and University of Lueneburg Graduate Faculty in Postcolonial Cultural Studies Visiting Scholars’ Writing Fellowship Award (2002).
Professor Ousseina Alidou has been a member of the ASA since 1994. Her other previous appointments and services include Chair of the All African Studies Programs (USA) (2009-2011). Director of the Center for African Studies at Rutgers University (2009-Spring2015); She taught in several American Universities including (University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign; The Ohio State University; Ohio University; Cleveland State University) and was a visiting Professor at the University of Hamburg in Germany and the University of Lueneburg (Germany); a visiting Professor at Université Abdou Moumouni (Republic of Niger); She served as external doctoral thesis reviewer University of Winneba (Ghana); She serves as a Senior Faculty Advisor to UNESCO BREDA’s Gender and Transformative Leadership Curriculum Design for African Universities and Civil Society.
Selected Publications
-Post-Conflict Reconstruction in Africa. Co-edited with Ahmed Sikainga. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2006.
-Engaging Modernity: Muslim Women and the Politics of Agency in Postcolonial Niger Madison:University of Wisconsin Press, 2005.
-A Thousand Flowers: Social Struggles Against Structural Adjustment in African Universities. Co-edited with Silvia Federici and George Caffentzis. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 2000.
-“Women, Religion and the Discourse of Legal Ideology in Niger Republic” with Hassana Alidou (Africa Today, Vol 54 (3) Spring 2008: 21-36.
-“Muslim Women in a Multilingual Context: Orality and Literacy in Postcolonial Niger” in Issues in Political Discourse Analysis, Vol 1 (1), 2006: 89-106.
-“The Emergence of Written Hausa Literature” In The Cambridge History of African and Caribbean Literature. Edited by Abiola Irele and Simon Gikandi. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, February, 2004, 329-356.
-“Women and the Politics of Education in Niger Republic” In Die Rolle der Zivilgesellschaft und Religion bei der Demokratisierung Afrikas (The Role of Civil Society and Religion in Africa’sDemocratization. Edited by Lawford Imunde. Loccumer Protokolle 55/00, Rehburg-Loccum: Loccum Academie, (August), 2003: 281-292.
-“Islam, Gender and Hausa Folklore: A Reconfiguration of a Hausa ‘Cinderella’ Tale” Comparative Literature, Vol. 54 (3), Summer 2002: 242-255.
-“Boundaries of Fatherhood in Farah's Secrets” In Emerging Perspectives on Nuruddin Farah. Edited by Derek Wright. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 2002: 661-678.
-“French Colonial Education and its Postcolonial Legacy in Francophone Africa” in Visionen fur das Bildungssystem in Afrika (Reflections on Education Systems in Africa). Edited by Lawford Imunde. Loccumer Protokolle 05/02, Rehburg-Loccum: Loccum Akademie, (July) 2002: 51-64.
-“Gender, Narrative Space and Modern Hausa Literature.” Research in African Literatures, Vol. 32 (2), Summer 2002: 137-153.
-“Francophone, the World Bank and the Collapse of Francophone Africa's Educational System.” in A Thousand Flowers: Social Struggles Against Structural Adjustment in African Universities. Co-edited with Silvia Federici and George Caffentzis. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 2000: p. 37-42.
-“Women, Gender and Freedom of Expression: Sub-Saharan Africa” in The Encyclopedia of Women and Islamic Cultures. Edited by Suad Joseph. Leiden: Brill Publishing, 2004:152-153.
-“Women in Niger” in The Greenwood Encyclopedia of Women’s Issues Worldwide: Sub-Saharan Africa. By Lynn Walter (Editor in chief) and Aili Mari Tripp (Volume editor), Westport, CT and London, UK: Greenwood Press, 2003, 295-310.
Courses Offered
- Introduction to African Literature in Translation (undergraduate course)
- African Folklore (undergraduate course)
- Crossroads: Classical Literatures of Africa, the Middle East and South Asia (undergraduate course)
- Islam and African Women Writers (graduate course)
